“What’s this, Milani?” she asked the trooper.
“We’re your escort,” they replied, gesturing to themselves and Bertoli. “The whole ship is in watch-your-back protocol, but we know there are extra assassins gunning for you. You, Commander, in particular.
“Rest of the Memorials can buddy-system it if they want, but we’ve got a note up to be ready to provide armed escorts for them if they ask. You don’t get a choice.”
Kira shook her head.
“And who do I argue with over that?” she asked.
“Right now, me. And you aren’t winning,” Milani replied, their voice cheerful. “And since you have an appointment to keep with a five-thousand-crest-an-hour lawyer, I suggest we don’t have that argument.
“Since you’ll lose,” they repeated.
Kira studied the armored merc with their licensed blaster—the weapon she couldn’t carry aboard Blueward Station and distinctly felt the lack of—for several more seconds, then sighed.
“Fall in, Milani,” she told them. “You don’t get to come into the meeting—and please exchange the minimum necessary glowers with the Ironborn.”
“That’s still a lot of glowering and one-upping, sir,” Milani pointed out. “Just so you know.”
“When we’re back, I’m raising this with Estanza,” she warned them.
“That’s fine,” the merc replied. “Where do you think the order came from?”
Kira grimaced. There were downsides, it appeared, to convincing the Captain to finally leave his office.
Glowering or not, the mercenaries split off to secure the waiting room at Simoneit’s office. The young woman sitting in the space—presumably a client for one of Simoneit’s junior partners—looked taken aback by the pair of armored men.
Taken aback or not, Jerzy Bertoli had her smiling cautiously as he offered to grab her coffee before Kira and Cartman stepped into the meeting room where Dirix waited for them.
“Stipan,” Kira greeted the broad-shouldered man. “Where’s Bardacki?”
“He’ll be here in about half an hour,” her administrator told her. “I wanted to run through the basic details of what your shoreside operations are looking like first.”
“All right. Simoneit will be joining us?” Kira asked.
“In half an hour,” Dirix said with a chuckle. “He knows most of this.”
“Are you still technically under arrest?” she asked.
Dirix sighed and bowed his head.
“Not quite,” he pointed out. “I’m under bail terms, not arrest. I can’t leave the station until I face a tribunal that’s set for just over three months from now. I’m not allowed to carry weapons or act as a bodyguard, either. Once the tribunal is over, I can reapply for those licenses and—so long as I’m cleared—I should get them easily enough.”
“Which is what you thought the first time and got yourself in this mess, yes?” Kira prodded.
“Yes, sir,” he confirmed, military habit kicking in.
“All I want from you, Stipan, is honesty,” Kira told him. “You saved Evridiki Bardacki’s life by all accounts. That’s what I hired you to do. I just need you to be entirely up-front with me.”
“I understand, sir,” Dirix conceded. “What do you need?”
“You wanted to go over our shore establishment, and we’ll get to that, but I need data first,” Kira said. “In your message, you said Bardacki’s attackers weren’t local bounty hunters. Do you know who they were?”
“They weren’t local at all,” he replied. “I’ve got a few ins with Station Security and they can’t ID them. The first group you collided with wasn’t from Blueward Station, but Security knew them. Expensive in-system talent, willing to kill for coin.
“Most bounty hunters aren’t,” he explained. “The Cluster isn’t organized enough for any kind of interstellar police. There’s no SolFed Marshals out here.”
“There’s no SolFed Marshals within a thousand light-years of here,” Kira pointed out.
The Solar Federation was nearly a legend this far out. They were one of the few known true multistellar states, a union of the forty or so stars closest to Sol. Treaties and agreements gave their Marshals authority well beyond their borders, with the organization acting as an interstellar police force across almost the entire Core.
Respect for their role, authority and sponsor carried their effective authority to the edge of the Heart—and probably beyond that. A SolFed Marshal had no authority in Redward, but that didn’t mean anyone would stop them from arresting someone and dragging them back to the Federation to face trial.
“Fair enough,” Dirix conceded. “But my point stands, sir. Without formal extradition treaties, bringing criminals back to face justice is hard. Even Redward posts bounties, but even a dead-or-alive bounty is rare and only valid in the system that posts it.
“Mostly, it’s extrajudicial rendition,” he concluded. “Glorified kidnapping, but because the targets are criminals, people have just grown to accept it.
“There are always a few people who will go for the dead-or-alive bounties with the assumption that if they kill someone, they can sneak themselves and the body out to avoid charges. It’s still legally murder, but most of these groups are interstellar in nature and will just go somewhere else to avoid the charges.
“The hunters who came for you two and Nicastro were a local branch of one of those groups.” Dirix glanced over at Cartman and clearly decided not to delve more into that particular topic.
“The people who came after Bardacki were something else entirely,” he concluded. “Blueward Station Security is chasing shadows.”
“Shadows is a word with particular meaning to us,” Kira pointed out. “The Shadows are the Brisingr Kaiserreich’s black operations team.”
“They didn’t come that far,” Dirix said with a forced chuckle. “But you’re looking at the same kind of thing. I should have been more clear. BSS doesn’t know who they were. I have a pretty solid guess.”
“That I’m guessing you didn’t want to put in a recording?” Kira asked.
“These people killed my boyfriend,” Cartman said grimly. “They keep trying to kill our friends. Who the hell are they?”
“It’s all the bounty, Em Cartman,” Dirix replied. “The people who came after Bardacki and I have clashed before. Not…everything I did for Redward was aboveboard, Commander Demirci.”
“Given that the Royal Army has never officially done anything outside the Redward System, I’m not entirely surprised by that,” Kira said. “Who were they, Stipan?”
“Special forces of the Ypres Hearth,” he said simply. “Not the elite assassins they like to pretend they are, but still solid dark-side operators. I recognized the gear and the combat style.”
He shrugged.
“They might not be Hearth,” he conceded. “But they’re Ypres special forces and they fought like Hearthers. They were from one of Ypres’ factions.”
“I’m really starting to hate that system, and I jumped right past it on my trip here,” Kira concluded. “What do they have in for us?”
“I don’t have a clue,” Dirix admitted. “Each of the Ypres factions thinks they’re a major player in the cluster because Ypres would be a major player in the cluster if it was actually unified. Because it’s five separate factions, they’re mostly ignored.”
“And I’m guessing all of them are sucking up to Brisingr,” Kira said grimly.
Or worse, they might even be sucking up to Estanza’s “Equilibrium Institute,” if that organization actually existed.
“It would follow,” he confirmed. “Ypres was the payout point for your bounties.” Dirix shook his head. “Right now, I’m using Ironborn for security on your people, but as we go forward, Memorial is probably going to want to hire some security of our own.”
“That makes sense to me,” Kira conceded, glancing over at Cartman. “I don’t want to end up at the point where our shore office ends up mostly managing security for
our shore office. Am I clear?”
“Well, that brings us back to just what you want the shore office to do, Commander.”
“How about you start with laying out what you’ve been doing?” Kira suggested. “And if needed, we can continue the conversation after we speak to Bardacki.”
“Of course,” Dirix agreed. “First things first, of course, I am currently sourcing a physical office here on Blueward Station…”
33
Bardacki hadn’t changed a bit. He was still a solidly built man well into his fifties. Age hadn’t slowed his reflexes or rusted his skills, and it had brought a level sense of calm equanimity that Kira had always prized in a squadron’s second.
He hadn’t been her second, but she’d been impressed with him regardless. Now, as the Ironborn bodyguards settled into the apparently-required glower-off with her Conviction bodyguards behind him, he took in the occupants of the meeting room with an amused smirk.
“Figured that Moranis had put the lion’s share of fixing this mess on you, Demirci,” he told her. “Guessing the old man buried a pile of money out here and smuggled nova fighters out? The lawyer strikes me as his type.”
“Depending on how you mean that, both yes and no,” Simoneit agreed as he stepped through another door concealed in the wall of the meeting room. Kira hadn’t even noticed the concealed entrance, and she stared in surprise at the opening.
“Jay and I were never lovers, but we were good friends for a very long time. He asked me to make sure there was a fallback point for him out here—for him and his husband, initially.”
Bardacki grunted.
“So, Moranis’s suggestion to me was to get out here and make contact with the Majors, which I’m guessing means you now,” he said. “I’m assuming you have some offer for me. I’m not interested.”
Kira blinked. That was the last thing she’d expected to hear.
“I haven’t even said a word yet,” she pointed out.
“You’ve got nova fighters,” Bardacki repeated. “Presumably, you want pilots. I’m guessing it’s a mercenary show, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve flown enough, Demirci. Left enough pilots dead in my wake to make a name for myself—and lost enough friends to truly understand what that name cost.
“I don’t want to be a nova fighter pilot anymore, and I don’t know what else you’ve got to offer me. I appreciate the assist with the bodyguards while I was here and I wanted to see you lot, know how many of the Three-Oh-Three survived, but I’m not signing on.”
“Including you, seven,” Kira said softly. “The three of us. Hoffman and Patil. Michel and Colombera. That’s it. Everyone else is dead, Evridiki.”
He grunted.
“Figures,” he finally said. “Anyone who rides with you, Demirci, is going to end up the same way. Nova fighter pilots die. It’s what we do. I’m done. I have my own reserves and I’m going to keep going.”
“Going where?” she asked, fumbling through her mental script as she tried to pull herself together. “Even if you won’t fly combat for us, there are other roles we can offer with the Squadron.”
“A long damn way from anywhere where anyone knows me, knows Apollo, or knows Brisingr,” he told her. “I figure bounce around the Rim for a year or so, then head coreward a long way from home. I’m sorry, Demirci, but I’d rather not tell you where I’m going.
“And I can’t stay. Even if I just joined Em Dirix here and ran admin for you, the urge to ask me to fly when you needed me—and the urge for me to do so—would be irresistible for us both. I don’t want to be the emergency pilot.
“I just want to be done.”
“Okay,” Kira accepted in a sharp exhalation. “I won’t pretend I wouldn’t rather have you on my wing, Evridiki, but I can respect what you want. And I can help with that, too.”
“And how’s that?” he asked.
“Pree?” she gestured to the lawyer. “You set it up.”
“Jay Moranis sent the seed capital that set up Memorial Squadron with the intention of making sure all of his pilots were taken care of when they made it out here,” Simoneit told Bardacki. “Simply by arriving in the Redward System, you became a part-owner of the Squadron.
“If you don’t wish to become one of the Squadron’s pilots, the incorporation articles require that you accept a buyout based on the initial valuation of those shares,” the lawyer continued. “Functionally, this is Memorial Squadron honoring the intent of the original source of funding that these funds be available to you.”
“How much?” Bardacki asked cautiously.
Simoneit gave him the number and the pilot studied him in silence.
“Is that enough to buy a ship out here?” he finally asked.
“Not a great one,” the lawyer admitted. “I could probably pull some strings and manage to acquire, say, a fifteen-thousand-cubic-meter small-crew freighter for that. It will only be Redward-level systems and tech though.”
“If it can nova and get out of this system, I can keep her running after that,” Bardacki said flatly. “What’re those strings going to cost me?”
“Memorial will cover Simoneit’s time,” Kira told him. “You may not want to keep flying with us, but you’re still family. We’ll buy out your shares and help you get a ship. Seems the least we can do.”
“Fair.” She could see him relax. “Sorry, Kira. I was worried you’d take this harder than you did.”
“I’d rather you stayed,” she told him. “But I’ll take picking a friend up and helping him go his way under his own power over another damn message telling me he died. You get me, Evridiki?”
“I get you, Kira,” he conceded with a chuckle. “Once I have my ship, I’ll have to have you aboard for dinner. All of you, if it has a big-enough dining room.”
“I’ve been on ships that size,” she warned him. “You might be aiming too high with dining room.”
“You’ll take care of everything for him?” Kira asked Simoneit after Bardacki had left.
“Of course,” the lawyer promised. “That’s what you pay me for.”
“I know what we pay you, and I’m still not sure we’re worth the hassle you get with us,” Kira said with a chuckle. “I appreciate it, Pree. All of it.”
“I know,” the lawyer said with a smile. “It will be easier, of course, to get a good ship for Em Bardacki if the budget is more flexible?”
“A little flex,” she said, holding her fingers up a centimeter or so apart. “We’ll put a bit of extra money behind making sure he’s okay, but we also need to watch for the rest of us.
“I’m not sure we’ll get to keep Michel and Colombera now,” she admitted.
“They’re younger,” Cartman reminded her. “And I’m not sure either of them would ever be willing to give up flying, not for anything.”
“We’ll find out in a day or so, I suppose,” Kira agreed. “They’ll be coming directly aboard Conviction; we shouldn’t need any immediate help from you, Pree.”
“You found two more?” the lawyer asked. “Thank gods.”
“Captain Estanza found two more,” Kira admitted. “He put out a call in the mercenary community—which reminds me of what I do need. What’s the best way to pay a merc for bounties? Estanza apparently promised I’d pay for safe delivery of my people, and I see every reason to keep that promise.”
“Same way you brought money here,” Simoneit told her. “Bearer cred sticks, though I’d suggest crests not new drachmae. The Bank of the Royal Crest did an incredible job making themselves the reserve currency of choice around here.”
“All right. Dirix—there’s a quarter-million-crest bounty for the head of any of my pilots. I want six hundred thousand crests drawn from Memorial’s accounts into bearer sticks by end of day tomorrow. Can we manage that?”
“I’ll need your imprint on the forms with the bank,” Dirix replied. “It might be easier if the three of us go visit the Bank of the Royal Crest here on Blueward together.”
He blinked.
<
br /> “Three hundred thousand a head?” he asked.
“And if you want to put that number out to the bounty hunting community, feel free,” she told him. “We should have thought of it when we first got set up—if Brisingr wants to offer a quarter-million for my people to end up dead, I can fucking outbid them for safe delivery.”
She sighed.
“Easy enough, too, since even in a best case, there’s only one more of us out there.”
34
Commodore Shang Tzu was one of the few people Kira had ever met who made her feel tall. The mercenary commander was of distinctly Asian descent in a way few people were this far out into the Rim, but he was barely a hundred and fifty centimeters tall.
Some of his lack of height was made up for by one of the largest and bushiest beards she’d ever seen on a human being. Despite the scale of the thing, Shang’s beard was neatly trimmed and managed.
It was just bigger than the rest of his head.
“Commander Demirci,” he greeted her cheerfully with a two-handed handshake. “Captain Estanza said good things about you!”
“And I’m sure ‘she’ll pay you for saving her people’ was one of the more important ones,” Kira replied with a chuckle as she saw Evgenia Michel and Abdullah Colombera emerge from the docking tube onto the flight deck behind Shang.
Each was escorted by a mercenary in mismatched armor who peeled off at the edge of Conviction’s deck.
“It was definitely mentioned,” Shang confirmed. “And I won’t turn down the money, either. But I’ll admit that knowing my boys roughed up some Hearthers didn’t hurt.”
“We appreciate your intervention, Commodore Shang,” Kira told him, and produced the cred stick. “Unless it’s been updated, the death mark on my people is a quarter-million crests apiece. This stick is for twenty percent more than that.”
The mercenary paused with his hand on the bearer stick.
“That might actually be too much,” he said slowly, some of his bright cheer fading. “I didn’t save your people for money, Commander Demirci. My people saved them to be good sports. All I offered was a ride.”
Conviction (Scattered Stars: Conviction Book 1) Page 19